


Lessons Learned at a Crucial Point in Time

by jukeboxhound



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-21
Updated: 2012-12-21
Packaged: 2017-11-21 21:39:44
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,835
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/602352
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jukeboxhound/pseuds/jukeboxhound
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>And Tony, he’s a smart fucking guy, he learns: your enemies teach you the best tricks, that people see what they want to see, and that if you have get stuck with someone else then at least make sure it’s another scientist or two.</p><p>Or: several times Tony had no one to save him but himself, and one time he did.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lessons Learned at a Crucial Point in Time

**Author's Note:**

  * For [dante_s_hell](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dante_s_hell/gifts).



> Written for dante_s_hell for the Avengers Holiday Exchange on LJ, with the prompt: "Tony gets hurt on a mission and the Hulk won't let anyone near him. The Avengers have to "talk" him down so they can help Tony." I hope it hits what you wanted, and happy holidays. :)
> 
> For those who may not know: Sunset Bain was one of 616!Tony's first girlfriends when he was a teenager. She seduced him to steal his tech, started up Baintronics, and then tossed him to the curb. She hangs around some years later to keep fucking with his head.

...

He’s the son of a man who made his fortune on war and a public image on patriotism and large charity donations.  It isn’t unusual to hear death threats hissed in crowded rooms, see them reproduced in sensationalist tabloids, for men in dark suits to look at him in a way that makes Tony want to hide in his room.  He likes his room, with the Scooby Doo sheets and the glow-in-the-dark star stickers on the ceiling and his little robots that make beeping noises, and the only people that go in there are the maid and Jarvis.

 

But he’s the son of a man who has the president in his debt, and the first time Tony is stolen is inside Macy’s, of all places.  His father is there to argue with someone about a Stark product and it’s boring, it’s stupid, even Tony knows this isn’t about the damn product itself and he thinks, Whatever.  He thinks, Oh, I hear a thing, a loud thing, I think it’s in the kitchen appliances.  So he ducks away from the latest person hired to keep an eye on him so his parents don’t have to and follows the sound of a blender gone off-kilter, jeeze, why don’t people know how to handle these things properly.

 

He’s grabbed between the rear of the electronics department and the exit.  A hand goes over his mouth as he’s swept up, feet kicking uselessly in the air, and he’s dropped into a plain beige car.  He manages to sink his teeth into the flesh of the hand just before a bag is pulled over his head.  “Son of a bitch,” he hears, “little fucker better be fucking worth it, you sure we can’t just dump him over a bridge?”

 

And Tony, who’s maybe sixty, seventy pounds on a good day, who knows about a lot of things like terminal velocity and Newton’s third law, struggles harder because this isn’t his dad talking when he’s maybe had a little too much to drink, Tony’s snuck a few late-night films by now to know how this ends.

 

As it happens, it does end on a bridge, but only because Tony had some paperclips with pointy tips and a piece of gum in his pockets, working knowledge of leverage, and his kidnappers’ underestimation, and he tumbles out of the car onto the sidewalk to a soundtrack of kidnappers’ screaming and cursing.  There are witnesses, and the police eventually take him back to his father in Macy’s, who sees Tony’s hands being held by two cops and says, Tony, what did I tell you about wandering off.

 

“But Dad,” says Tony.

 

“Sir,” say the cops, “there was an incident.”

 

Turns out the kidnappers were actually a couple of disgruntled former employees and a labor activist, and Howard Stark makes sure that they’re sentenced to the lawful maximum.  Tony, he’s a smart kid, right, he learns a few things: that money is more powerful than justice, that his father hadn’t realized he was gone, and that no one else had come to his rescue.

 

I wonder if Captain America, he starts to think, then stops himself because he’s not a kid anymore and only little kids still play with action figures.  He pulls out his plans for a new type of personal security weapon, one that can hide in a person’s pocket.

 

…

 

He’s the son of a man who once helped create a bomb so terrifying it silenced over eighty-thousand people in seconds and started the nuclear clock ticking towards midnight.  He’s seventeen with everything to prove and MIT never knows what hit it.

 

Tony says, “Lab work would be so much easier if you could just program a damn assistant.”

 

His robotics professor tells him, “That’s impossible.”

 

Tony says, “Watch me,” and he spends the next three weeks living in the depths of his apartment.  It’s spacious, obscenely expensive and practically a penthouse since Daddy’s footing the bill, but it looks more like a lab fucked a chop shop and gave birth to something with more metal than furniture.  He had to rent the apartment immediately below because of the clanging.  It’s three weeks of whiskey and cold coffee, migraines and hands shaking from exhaustion, the dazzling high of innovation and defying all known science.  Steel plating is his bed and electric cabling his pillow.  He breathes in numbers and exhales code and goes to sleep with computers humming him a lullaby.

 

“You need help, man,” Rhodey tells him seriously, and Tony retorts, “I got everything I’ll ever need right here, Rhodes.”

 

So three weeks pass in which Tony periodically forgets that his flesh and blood aren’t the same as the creature taking shape under his hands, and then there’s a knock at the door.  He doesn’t hear it over the hissing of the acetylene torch.  Doesn’t realize anyone’s there until he straightens his back with a pop and happens to look over.

 

“Tony, darling,” says Sunset.  “You’ve been busy lately.”

 

“Just making a new piece of the future, you know how it is,” he grins, because he’s still seventeen and so, so _stupid_.

 

Sunset saunters closer, her skintight dress shifting over her body like a snake’s skin, and it inspires that familiar mix of nervousness and adrenaline that always follows along in her shadow.  She smiles with lips as red as blood against skin as white as snow and hair as black as coal.  Tony’s stomach tightens, and he tells himself it’s a good thing.

 

“Tell me about it?” she asks.

 

Tony looks at the creature he’s been sweating and occasionally bleeding over: a long arm, clawed fingerlike digits, basic jointwork – just enough of a frame to hold the information that the attached computers are feeding it.

 

“It’s just a prototype, but it’ll revolutionize mechanized assistance in nuclear and chemical laboratories,” he explains, waving around a wrench.  “It can withstand low-level radiation and any number of caustic substances, hell, when I stabilize its mobility it’ll be able to help in fuckin’ neurosurgery.  Install a rudimentary AI with a learning curve – “

 

“I have a present for you,” she says suddenly, abruptly breaking off his flow, and holds out something small, flat, and rectangular.  “I heard about what you’re trying to do – “

 

“I _am_ doing,” Tony interrupts, and an odd expression passes over her face as she corrects smoothly, “What you _are_ doing.  You certainly have the engineering department in an uproar.”

 

“Unimaginative assholes.”

 

“Well,” says Sunset with a white-toothed smile, “I never once doubted that you’d be the one to make us all a new future.”

 

Tony flushes despite himself.  He’s seventeen and still gangly, she’s twenty-two and everything a guy could possibly want; it’s ridiculous that he should feel a little trepidation about taking the tablet she’s holding out to him.

 

(Of course, the last time she handed something to him, it was a flog or a whip or something, not one of those idiotic silk things found in novelty shops but a thing made of calf leather, as dark and sleek as Sunset Bain herself at her red-lipped best.  And it…hadn’t been _bad_ , just one more kinky thing, and if he’d had trouble leaning his back against anything for a while, it wasn’t a big deal.  He was fucking a woman with a talented tongue in every sense of the word, confident and ambitious, brilliant in her own right – it was practically love.  Fuck you, Dad, and your _nothing good ever comes of sentimentality_.)

 

He reaches out, fingers brushing over hers, and takes the tablet.  There’s a prick against his palm and then his knees are buckling under him, the floor rushing up to meet him as his muscles lock up, and he ends up laid flat on the ground, still breathing and blinking but otherwise completely paralyzed.

 

What, he thinks blankly.  Can’t comprehend what the hell just happened as he stares at Sunset’s stilettos.

 

“Really now, Tony, darling, you should’ve known better,” Sunset purrs, stepping over him with her heels clicking like a bomb’s countdown.  She picks up the small tablet and heads for the computers wired to the odd robot, sliding it into the floppy port.  Her scarlet nails click as neatly over the keyboard as her stilettos over his useless body.  “Don’t worry, it’s nothing too damaging.  The paralytic will wear off soon and your cute little genius brain will be just fine.”

 

Tony’s thoughts are crashing into one another and he can’t sort them out.

 

“Oh, don’t look at me like that,” Sunset says chidingly.  “I’ll get what I came for and you’ll never have to see me again outside the boardroom.  Your technique could use some polishing, but it was fun while it lasted.”

 

She’s hijacking three weeks’ worth of cold coffee and the sleepless high of innovation, when all the numbers and laws of physics and, hell, the planets all align just right and the universe _makes sense_ for one glorious moment.  He can’t tear his eyes away as the dam breaks and it all goes flooding down through her fingers into that goddamn tablet.  The datastream breaks and takes Tony’s heart with it.

 

The robot whirs awake with the groan of new gears and the crackle of electric life.  Its fingers flex experimentally, the arm stretching out with a smooth motion broken up with small jerks and twitches to cross the space towards Sunset’s back.  She doesn’t notice through the greed fixing her gaze on the stolen code until its fingers snag the back of her dress.

 

“What the hell,” she starts, but the robot’s grip doesn’t budge as it drags her backwards away from the computers.  She snarls and tries to reach back to break its hold, but it tosses her aside as easily as a kid throws a doll across a bedroom and she lands hard on her side several feet away.

 

Sensation is slowly returning to Tony’s limbs, just enough for him to lift himself onto his elbows and pull himself along the floor towards the robot and the computers.  He doesn’t know if it’s going to grab him too but he’s beyond caring, _fuck all this shit_ , but instead it makes a weird sort of chirping noise and lowers itself to his height.

 

Tony stares at it for a long moment before reaching out with a trembling hand, fingers sliding over cool steel.  It chirps again and raises its arm, carefully pulling him upright just enough for him reach the main computer.

 

Good boy, he manages in a tight whisper, and ejects the tablet.  Immediately the datastream snaps back to normal, but he can already see the holes torn into it.

 

“Stark,” Sunset hisses, and robot raises itself to its full height, scooting forward on its wheels.

 

In the end, Sunset escapes with her life if not her stolen tech, Tony crushes the tablet in one of the fabricating units, and he spends the next four nights curled up tight against his glitchy robot, trying not to laugh hysterically as it attempts to make him something to eat and ends up smashing half the appliances in its clumsiness.

 

Tony’s a smart kid and he learns a few things: that humans will fuck you over, that love is something to be avoided, and the only people you can trust are the ones made of steel and wires.

 

…

 

He’s the son of a man who ruled the business world with an iron fist, and he knows that’s what his company’s directors look for every time they look at him.  He also knows that they’re disappointed every time, but hey, that’s the problem with having expectations.

 

It’s the year that Rhodey got promoted and started having to pretend that he isn’t secretly repressing a wild child in that all-American tastiness he’s got, and it’s the year that Obie slides a pile of resumes across the desk and says, Pick one.

 

“That one,” says Tony.

 

“Tony, be serious here.  You need a PA.  You can’t keep driving them off like this.”

 

“Yeah, I know, and I pick that one,” Tony sighs, still thinking of fluid dynamics.

 

“She has the least experience of all these people – “

 

“And so she’s got the most to lose here.  Don’t look at me like that Obie, seriously, you’ll give me a rash.”

 

So Rhodey gets sucked up into the gears of war and Pepper Potts steps into the picture.  It takes a little while for the clicking of her heels to stop sounding like death knells that come in red lipstick, and he can tell that she’s a bit in awe of him, but when he tries to ask her out a week into her employment she turns him down with a flat and professional, “No.  Will that be all, Mr. Stark?”

 

Oh, he likes this one.

 

Then a gunman breaks into a presentation that Tony’s making down in R&D and starts ranting about turning death into a brand name and genocide into a capitalist venture.  The other scientists look either terrified or mulish – how dare this asshole ruin a perfectly fascinating technological breakthrough, fuck him, and god, Tony loves how singleminded some of his brethren can be – as the gunman orders them to sit on the floor with their hands on their heads.  Tony, still standing apart from the others, spreads his arms and says, “Can’t we all just get along?”

 

“Fuck you,” snarls the gunman, who doesn’t notice Tony passing his fingers over his own ears.

 

So much for witty repartee, he thinks as he lets his hands fall back down and slide into his pockets.  The gunman’s making demands about things like _human rights_ and _environmentalism_ , apparently unclear as to how the Real World in the United States of America actually functions or the fact that Stark Industries pioneered a number of those things in the corporate world.  Hell, one can argue Tony’s simply fulfilling his Constitutional duty, God bless the Second Amendment.

 

“So what’re your demands,” Tony drawls, actually looking forward to this part.  It always has the potential to be the most interesting part, except then the guy says something about shutting down the factories and distributing the Stark wealth to the families of his victims and then, well, it isn’t _interesting_ so much as somewhere between hilarious and sobering.  Tony gets a gun shoved in his face, and he decides he isn’t drunk enough for this.

 

A couple scientists are muttering amongst themselves, wondering where the hell security is.  Tony smirks and says, “Right here, ladies and gentlemen,” and pulls out a small device with a button on it.  The gunman is still up in his face, of course, and the scientists are a good several feet away, so when Tony pushes that shiny little button only the gunman hears that high-pitched screech that makes his body lock up and collapse.

 

Tony catches the gun before it falls, examining it disinterestedly.  Glock, semiauto, .9mm, blah blah blah; all mundanely standard fare.  It comes apart under his hands as easily as a one-night stand.

 

Later, after security arrives too late and drags the gunman away, after his scientists have either had their nervous breakdown or gone straight back to their work with disgruntled mutterings, after he’s taken out the small earplugs and shown Obie the paralyzing device, he goes home with Pepper stalking his shadow.

 

“I’m fine,” he tries for the hundredth time, but she’s having none of it, refusing to leave until security calls back to say that the leak’s been fixed, even if it takes half the company into overtime.

 

“I don’t know why you’re so worried,” he scoffs as he heads for his bedroom, leaving a trail of clothes behind him.

 

“I don’t know why you’re _not_ ,” she snaps as she picks up the clothes.

 

“If I worried every time my life was threatened then I’d be in the hospital after my fifth heart attack.  I’d also have wrinkles, Ms. Potts, and that is just not acceptable.”

 

“And the day someone succeeds?”

 

Tony shrugs.  “I’ll figure it out.  I always do.”

 

 And Tony, he’s a smart fucking guy, he learns: that your enemies teach you the best tricks, that people see what they want to see, and that if you have get stuck with someone else then at least make sure it’s another scientist or two.

 

…

 

He gets kidnapped, spends three months in Afghanistan, and his surrogate father attempts to kill him.

 

We all know how that turned out.

 

…

 

One day Tony fucks up in the lab and spills solvent over his hands.  He runs to the sink and sticks them under running water, cursing under his breath as DUM-E obediently wheels over with a first-aid kit.

 

“Jesus, Tony,” sighs Bruce when he catches sight of Tony fumbling with a topical cream on the other side of the lab.  He immediately heads over and plucks the first-aid supplies right out of Tony’s grip.  “I _do_ have some experience with this sort of thing, why didn’t you just ask me for help?”

 

Tony watches Bruce slather the reddened skin with truly awful-smelling goop.  “You were busy.”

 

“Not too busy to keep your livelihood from melting off.”

 

“Aww, you _do_ care.”

 

“ _Tony_.”

 

Tony shrugs.  “Just never occurred to me, kumquat.”

 

Bruce gives him a searching look over the top of his glasses.  “It never occurred to you to ask for help?”

 

“Really?  You’re going to give me the ‘you shouldn’t be afraid to ask other people for help’ speech?  _You?”_

 

“Point,” Bruce admits, and goes back to scrubbing gently at Tony’s skin.  After a minute he ventures, “Still…”

 

“Yeah, yeah, message received, you hippie.”

 

…

 

He’s the son of a man who pioneered the future of technology, and he gets taken out with a simple goddamn EMP pulse.

 

Well, it was more complex than that, but essentially it all boiled down the Iron Man suit, an EMP emitter, and a clever villain with a grudge.  Tony’s strapped down to a steel table under a harsh fluorescent light that burns his eyes, naked as the time a paparazzo caught him in a hot tub with two supermodels, and he supposes that, whatever happens, at least he can be grateful that he’s in a relatively sterile environment this time with aches instead of stabbing agony.  Those scalpels look clean enough to be in a hospital’s OR.

 

He doesn’t know what happened in the time between he got caught mid-battle against this villain’s goons, the armor shutting down two hundred feet above a concrete parking structure, and waking up in a scene straight from a _Saw_ film feeling like he went three rounds with an anesthesiologist’s chemicals and lost.  He doesn’t know if the other Avengers are looking for him or if they even saw him go down, fuck knows that all the strategizing in the world doesn’t control the chaos of battle, and he doesn’t know how long he’s been here or how long he should _expect_ to be here.

 

By the time the villain wanders in, Tony’s thought of nine ways to escape with the materials around him through the haze in his brain, none of which he can use while the restraints insist on being so goddamn tight.  He used to be pretty good at getting out of them –Sunset had made that something of a necessity at times – but these ones are serious business, folks.

 

“Tony Stark,” the villain purrs.  American accent, white guy in his early thirties, fit, attractive in a rather bland way.  He runs latex-gloved fingers over Tony’s bare ankle, idly tracing the bump of bone, and Tony thinks, Really?  We’re going there?  We’re actually, seriously going there?

 

“In the flesh,” Tony replies dryly, mouth full of cotton, and ignores the way his skin is starting to crawl.

 

“Beautiful.”

 

It takes a moment to realize that this asshole is talking about the arc reactor, eyes fixed on the glow that’s valiantly fighting the fluorescent lighting, which puts a whole new slant on things.  Tony honestly isn’t sure which of the villain’s possible motives is worse.

 

“Thanks.  I wasn’t really sure about it, I mean, I’m not usually one for extreme body modification, but that butterfly I was thinking about getting just above my ass just didn’t really seem to reflect my inner self, y’know?”

 

“You’re funny,” he says.  “I like that.”

 

“I’m glad one of us is getting his rocks off.”  Tony immediately wishes he could bite off his tongue because, wow, talk about one of the worst things he could say while naked and woozy and having his ankle caressed by a creeper with a fetish.  The villain (Christ, what’s his name?  The fuckers are popping out of the woodwork nowadays) just smiles thinly and drags his fingers up a thigh, the hollow of a hipbone, the length of his sternum, until they hover over the arc reactor, the latex of his glove turning an odd blue in its light.

 

“I’m afraid I don’t have the time to banter with you, Mr. Stark.  My time is precious, and I require this exquisite piece of technology.”

 

Tony raises an eyebrow, forcing his breathing to remain even as a gentle touch follows the perimeter of the reactor’s casing.  “Then why wait until I woke up?”

 

“Ah,” he says with a trace of embarrassment, “I’m afraid that was my own ego.  I wanted a few minutes for you to know that you were helpless, in the end.  A failure.”

 

Tony thinks of paperclips and gum, of paralyzing devices, of impenetrable armor he can wear like a second skin.  Ultimately it’s only ever been his own genius, his own creativity and creations, and now, without that, what the hell can he do?  Up until now, what’s been the fucking point?  He swallows a wave of nausea.  “I don’t suppose begging for my life would help?”

 

“Please don’t patronize me, Mr. Stark.”

 

“I’m not patronizing you, Dr. Evil, I’m giving you attitude.  My god, what are they teaching you villains nowadays if you can’t even relate to your prisoners properly?  I know you’re a dime a dozen, but have some professional pride.”

 

He ends up biting his tongue after all when the asshole slaps him across the face, and doesn’t get a chance to draw another breath before he hears the _click_ of the arc reactor being turned ten degrees to his right, the sound echoing hollowly in his chest.  His heart lurches with sudden terror and his head spins and _oh fuck no please_ , but then, right on time, there’s a distant roar.

 

“Who’d have thought,” he breathes softly as the villain whips around and heads for the door, yanking out a radio and demanding to know what the hell’s going on.

 

The roaring gets louder, accompanied by what sounds like a significant amount of damage to both property and humans.  Tony stares up at the ceiling, tapping a couple fingers together restlessly to let out some of the adrenaline telling him to run while he can’t, and hopes that he isn’t about to get squished by his rescuer.

 

The villain disappears out the door, shouting into his radio until he isn’t, until Tony hears a sickening crunch and then the door shatters into matchsticks.

 

“Hey, Jolly Green,” Tony calls out.  “Nice timing.”

 

The Hulk looks wildly around the room for something else to smash, broad fingers curling into either side of the doorjamb and splintering it beyond repair.  He moves to hover over Tony, so big and looming that Tony can’t see much other than green.  “This is mildly intimidating,” he comments.

 

“Metal Man,” the Hulk rumbles.  “Metal Man hurt?”

 

“Nah, just a bit tied up at the moment.”  Because some jokes simply beg to be made, especially when a guy is still in pain and trying to adjust from _about to die_ to _nope guess not_.  The Hulk pokes a finger the size of a Christmas sausage at one of the broad straps running over Tony’s arms and snarls.

 

“Whoa, hey, it’s okay, buddy,” Tony tries, holding back a somewhat hysterical laugh as his body starts to crash, and what he’s realizing is a fabulous concussion he got from his fall into concrete is determinedly making itself known.

 

“Metal man hurt,” the Hulk bellows, whirling around to smash a fist into the floor.  It makes a dent six inches deep and sends out a web of deep cracks.

 

“Tony!” comes a distant yell – and oh, hey, it’s Steve, would you look at that, the whole gang must be here.  How odd.

 

The Hulk jabs at the restraints again, but his fingers are too large to break them without also breaking Tony, and he howls, slamming his fists into the ground again in frustrated fury.  Tony laughs breathlessly, feeling not a little loopy from pain and relief and vanishing adrenaline.  “Hey, hey, I’m good, we’re all good, fucking fabulous.  C’mon, s’okay, get me a mimosa and I’ll be fine.”

 

“ _Tony!”_

 

“Heeey, Cap,” Tony drawls, letting his head fall to the side so he can see Steve and Natasha in the ruined doorway.   Steve has his shield half-raised, both of Natasha’s hands wrapped confidently around one of her guns.

 

“Status?” Steve asks with that adorable furrow of worry between his brows, and Tony snorts.

 

“Nothing feels broken, but you might want to make sure you wake me up every two or three hours.”

 

His view of the door is suddenly blocked by a mountain of green muscle vibrating with low, chest-deep growls, and he hears Steve and Natasha scramble backwards into the hallway.

 

“Bruce,” Steve says gently, “it’s okay.”

 

“Metal Man hurt,” the Hulk snarls.  “Hulk fix, no more hurt Metal Man!”

 

“He’ll get a lot more hurt if you don’t let us take him.”  Steve’s speaking carefully like the Hulk’s a freaking guard dog straining at the end of his leash, but the Hulk’s having none of it.  He looms over Tony and the surgical table, nostrils flaring with harsh panting.

 

“Hey, c’mere, Jolly Green,” Tony mumbles.  On second thought, he may need more than a mimosa after this.  “Front and center, young man, give the lovely people some room to work.”

 

After a long pause the Hulk finally lumbers to the side, still within arms’ reach.  Natasha watches him with a carefully blank expression as Steve steps forward cautiously, making no sudden moves, before reaching for the restraints.  The Hulk lets out an impressive grumble that makes Steve freeze for a few heartbeats.

 

“We haven’t got all day, darling, and I imagine we should get this over with sooner rather than later,” Tony comments to Steve with false casualty.  “Incidentally, where’s Sherwood Forest?”

 

“Doing clean-up,” Natasha replies calmly.

 

“That’s assassin-talk for killing anything that’s still moving, isn’t it?  Hulk, are you hearing this?  We have the most bloodthirsty people on this team, I’m worried for my health, wealth, and happiness.”

 

The Hulk is relaxing incrementally, still on high alert but not actively growling anymore as his attention wavers between Tony’s talking face and Steve’s hands snapping open the restraints.  When the last one comes free, the Hulk is already shouldering Steve aside and sliding his own enormous hands under Tony’s body before Tony has time to register what’s going on, picking him up with childlike care.

 

“Uh,” says Tony, finding himself cradled in arms as thick as concrete pillars and his hair being whuffled by a big green nose.

 

“Tony, are you all right?” Natasha demands tightly, and he manages to flail an arm reassuringly.

 

“Yeah, I’m fine, stand down, troops.”

 

The first thing he does is twist the arc reactor ten degrees back to the right.

 

“Let’s get out of here,” Steve breaks in with his ‘I Am Captain America, Hear Me Roar’ voice.  “Tony will go straight to medical and we’ll debrief afterwards.”

 

“Cap, I said I’m fine,” Tony starts, but the concrete pillars holding him like a goddamn infant flex warningly as the Hulk rumbles, “Metal Man lying.  Metal Man be quiet.”

 

“Tattler.”

 

“Metal Man stupid and give up.”

 

Natasha arches an eyebrow as Steve, predictably, asks, “Tony, what’s he talking about?”

 

“I have no idea,” Tony answers honestly.

 

“Not think the others come.  Think alone like Banner.”

 

“You didn’t think we’d come for you?”

 

“That true, Stark?”

 

“Uh,” provides Tony’s natural eloquence, “remember that concussion?  That thing I still have?  We should probably get that taken care of before I end up in a coma and there’s no more money to make you the coolest toys on the playground.”

 

“Shut up,” demands the Hulk, and when the Hulk demands you stop talking, you damn well shut your trap.

 

And this is how Tony, that smart fucking genius with three Ph.Ds and a wit sharp enough to cut himself on it, he learns: that the regular gifting of blueberries makes you the Hulk’s BFF, that ‘teammates’ doesn’t just have to be a word that looks good in PR statements, and sometimes it’s the monsters people wear on the outside that’ll one day be your saving grace.


End file.
